First Attempt at Sashiko

I worked on the little sashiko project last night.

First, I did the crosses with the white thread. I stitched the white crosses through two layers so the long, white basting stitches are holding the two layers together. The hank of thread has 40m on it so will be good for many other projects. 

Then the first bunch of weaving with the blue thread. This was not without error, however. A couple of times I had to pull out the stitches because I had woven through the wrong part of the white cross.  

Easily remedied, though, and only a small amount of bad language was uttered. Then finished the weaving in the other direction.

Next came the small, yellow crosses to anchor the centres of the blue 'flowers'.

Proper technique involves stitching continuously in one direction then the other with long thread. Sashiko thread is different from perle cotton in that it's not twisted as tightly and has not been mercerized. The result is a dull finish, kinda like thin butcher's string.

I'm eager to start another project that also involves weaving.

While cleaning out the closet in my office, I found this Christmas stocking stitched with 6-ply cotton floss. It would have been done YEARS ago. I had completed the stitching and had stitched my name on the top. I unpicked my name and filled in the gaps and just now have wet blocked it, using the same wires and pins I use when blocking my knitting.

As the needlepoint stitch is on a slant, it really skews the fabric so a firm blocking is needed to straighten things out.

There are supposed to be silk ribbon flowers on her dress but the kit only had about 20cm of silk ribbon; not nearly enough to do French knits on all the flowers. Instead, I'll use big, pink HotFix jewels on them and little sparkly ones on all the white dots.

It will need a backing and lining, too.